Be Your Own God
There seems to be a lot of polytheism in the art world lately. Joining a growing trend is artist and University of Iowa student Dan Luchman. Luchman’s latest show “Pantheon of Minor and Lesser Known Deities” is encouraging you to become a god.
“He’s making it easy. His poster, adorned with antlers and a bicycle bell, nearly audibly bellows at those entering Art Building West: “Hark! The birth of Polytheodemocracy, a new ideology allowing everyone to achieve equal access to an extra-mortal existence – together we will improve upon the divine with an egalitarian array of anthropomorhpic attributions.” There, you can pick up your “Application for Deification,” a half-sheet of paper that details Luchman’s step-by-step instructions … The poster even promises that all applicants will be rewarded with a gift of original artwork, a shrine erected in their honor and that their application will be examined and interpreted by a ‘real artist. Guaranteed.’”
It used to be you had to do important things (or at least attain a lot of worldly power) to become a deity, but Luchman thinks everyone should have a shot at god/dess-hood now. But this project isn’t an attempt to address a celestial imbalance, but to symbolically deemphasize divinity’s importance.
“A deity is supposed to be a representation of an ideal, but if anybody can be a deity and any personality has the potential to be divine, then it sort of destroys the idea. It makes the whole pantheon a collection of impotent deities. The divine loses its power … God is like a despot, religion crushes new ideologies. People like it when they’re not taking it seriously, but they’d abandon it if they though it was real. I think the most absurd thing is that I kind of do take it seriously. I like thinking [these deities] might exist.”
As someone who actually believes in a multiplicity of powers and entities, I don’t think polytheism deemphasizes divinity, but instead makes it more relevant to our day-to-day lives. But despite this difference of opinion with the artist, the project itself sounds interesting and I wouldn’t mind having a deified artist’s portrait.
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